Greatness Flicker
by vega rin
Summary: The team tries to work through their two high profile cases while Brian Peluso and Christina Finn try to deal with the personal ramifications of the confession taken place in Hostage. Neither proves to be an easy task. Ensemble.
1. Chapter 1

**Title: Greatness Flicker**  
Author: vega

Summary: The team tries to work through their two high-profile cases while Brian Peluso and Christina Finn try to deal with the personal ramifications of the confession taken place in _Hostage_. Neither proves to be an easy task. Ensemble, with strong B/C slant.  
Spoiler: For entire series, specifically the series finale _Hostage_.  
Disclaimer: Nope,these ain't mine, either. All legal terms and knowledge that one might or might not gain from reading this is solely from Wikipedia and my own John Grisham-educated mind, so please proceed with caution.

Note: Oh, look, another WIP. I wanted to write this ever since the season finale before realizing that timing and RL did not allow any room for it, but I did want to get it out there and have some resolution before the show disappears into complete oblivion. So here we are. This one should be (relatively) quick and short.

**Part I:**

* * *

"...Then Jack...was on top of me and...and..." 

The girl stopped, hiccupping in between crying and trying to talk at the same time. Christina obligingly picked up a kleenex and handed it over while exchanging sympathetic glances with Detective Kelly, who sat across the table looking appropriately pained at having to hear the incident reiterated.

Billy leaned forward, his best soothing persona in place. "Denise, I'm sorry you have to talk about this again, but your deposition is crucial to winning the case and putting him away. Whenever you can, please relax and tell us slowly how it happened."

Denise nodded, still trying to get hiccups under control. Tear streaks were running down all over her youthful face, what little makeup she had on her face completely obliterated.

A few minutes later, however, Denise was using up her tenth kleenex without any sign of recovering. The girl was near hysteria, Christina decided, and they weren't going anywhere today. She exchanged a look with Billy, who shook his head and sank deeply back into the chair. He wasn't happy, but he was seeing the same thing she was seeing. Christina wasn't all too happy either, but she was careful not to reveal any of that emotion on her face as she asked, "Would you rather continue your deposition later? We can afford to schedule it again in a couple of days, if you think it'd help."

Denise looked up, relief completely written on her face. She nodded, sniffling and slightly calmer, but she was still crying when Detective Kelly stood up to escort her out.

"Think she can make it good at the witness stand?" Billy turned to Christina as soon as they collected their file and headed out of the interview room. "If not in time for deposition, at least for the trial?"

Christina had already given this some thoughts. "With a lot of work, possibly, and practice. There's going to be a lot of pressure on her, and anyone who's going to do this needs guts."

"She's being shielded from the media?"

"I asked Detective Kelly." Billy nodded in approval, and Christina continued, thoughtful, "On the other hand, we don't want to drag it too long either, when there's always a chance that she'll lose her nerve."

"A-aaand I think we're about to get more help on that front. Look," Billy said, stopping on track and nodding his head toward a few men waiting at their office door. "The army of Crichton's lawyers. No doubt coming at us with more motions they want to file to delay the trial."

"Personal delivery?" Christina arched her eyebrow. Motions were usually mailed, not hand delivered. "Must be really desperate."

Of course, the defense lawyers, the representatives of Jack Crichton from the Harkman and Doyle, did nothing to hint at any possible desperation. Instead, they sat smugly in front of Billy and Christina as they argued for a very early, very quick and very light settlement.

"Did you have a very good dream last night?" Billy asked, after they had basically asked Crichton to be let go after a slap on the wrist.

One of the young ones from the entourage of the lawyers - one of many associates assigned to this case, no doubt - blinked. "I don't see what that has to do with --"

"Ah, but then maybe you were reading _Cosmopolitan_ horoscope and thought you'd get lucky today. Otherwise what would possess you enough to try to pass insane troll logic on us?"

The young lawyer, taking offense, all but fumed, but before could put a word in edgewise, Lawrence Kane, one of the older and presumably more experienced lawyers, took over the conversation - grimly and primly. "You don't want this dragged into the court. Media's gonna be all over this, and that can't be good for you, can it?"

"Like they haven't been already?" Billy practically snorted.

"This isn't a news to us, Mr. Kane," Christina added calmly. "All the sport channels have been keeping taps on this case even before he was arrested."

"Ah, but this is right after the hostage incident in the court house I and /i after the DA's Office's public admission that there were some misgivings about the evidence that almost led to the guy's conviction. Every defense lawyer's gonna jump at the chance to use this and get their cases dismissed on the charge of lack of evidence, malicious and unjustified intentions against--"

"Thanks for the reminders, man," Billy snapped, none-too-amused. "We only work for the District Attorney's Office, so of course we can't possibly know anything about how laws and media politics work."

Kane visibly took a step back. Rightfully so, Christina thought ruefully, if the man knew what was good for him. Any lawyer worth his dime should know not to face Billy's wrath when he was on a warpath; such high profile media case like this was Billy's pet project, one he'd like to chew on until something cracked, preferably the defendant. Billy Desmond became a bit known for such cases, after the rapper case.

Kane hastily reassembled his sentence again, "I'm only suggesting that if you might want to take this opportunity to get one of I'm sure your many headaches out of the way --"

"Your client drugged and raped a barely legal-aged girl in drunk stupor. If you have so little confidence in American justice system to think that we cannot prosecute and convict him, we'll take it as a personal insult."

Billy stood up, looming over them with his full height. Christina, who probably was the only one in the room who wasn't intimidated by Billy's gesture, flashed a bright smile at the defense lawyers and waved them toward the door. "Rest assured that we'll respond to any motion as quickly as you can file," she said, as she opened the door. "Thanks for dropping by, and have a nice day."

She closed the door as soon as the posse of the lawyers scrambled themselves up and left, and turned around.

Billy scowled. "Damned lawyers."

Christina almost grinned at the irony and decided not to point out that they, too, were lawyers. "At least they were sufficiently scared. They'll definitely think twice about filing even more unnecessary motions if they can just avoid having to talk to you again."

The prospect of less paperwork was usually enough to lighten up any mood, but this time, it lasted only a second. Billy looked thoughtful. "He won't settle for our terms, will he?"

Christina knew this was coming. She shook her head. "No, not when his public image is at stake. He would rather face the jail time than admit his guilt publicly."

"Or bribe the media into thinking that even when he gets convicted, he was innocent all along." Billy frowned in distaste. "Well, he will get what's coming for him."

Christina smiled, just a little, because Billy predictably said _when_ he got convicted, not _if_. She eyed several newspapers currently crowding her desk space. All the headlines colorfully decorated the name of Jack Crichton, the professional soccer player and perhaps one of the most well-known celebrity athletes, who was just accused of rape and sexual assaults. They were also uniformly stating the lack of evident against Crichton, and they were also pointing out the Wade debacle, how the DA's Office proved itself to be extremely unreliable and rather too flexible in their morals in acquiring convictions. The goons from the Harkman were unfortunately right - this was not going to be an easy case.

Crichton was flashing a winning smile in every picture, and Christina inevitably thought of Denise, her wrecked tears.

Yes, she thought, he'd get what he deserves.

* * *

A few hours later, the prospect of sticking Crichton with what he deserved looked a little more abysmal. She and Billy had gone through about five long, senseless and useless motions filed for dismissal of the case, but there were still about five more to dissect. They were good, very good, at trying to come up with every straw of reason to call for dismissal. They had to be good, Christina thought, thinking of all the poor paralegals and associates who must be stuck in the deepest parts of the Harkman and Doyle and trying to come up with more of these creative excuses for dismissal using every means possible. 

Chris stretched a little in their little kitchen and stared at the coffee machine, just to will it to work faster. It was already past the lunch hour, and she probably needed more than just coffee, but she had nothing in the fridge and there wasn't enough time to go out and grab something --

"Hey," a familiar, a very familiar voice suddenly said, and there was a wrapped sandwich in front of her eyes. "No lunch yet, I suspect."

Christina gratefully took the sandwich and turned to the owner of the hand that was offering it. She was already smiling. "Your suspicion is alarmingly correct."

Brian Peluso smiled and shrugged. "Then it's a good thing that I'm very good at reading minds."

The sandwich was pastrami on rye, exactly how she liked. "Very. Thanks."

He shook his head like it was nothing. And he turned curious, and maybe concerned. "How's Crichton thing going? Heard a bunch of his lawyers trying to gang up on you and Billy in the morning."

Right, this brief and shining interlude with Brian did not mean the case could be completely forgotten. She tried not to sigh. "It's going. In crawling speed."

"Need any help?" he asked casually.

Christina almost smiled again. It wasn't as if she hadn't noticed a mountain of case files on his own desk. "We might, but not yet. Thanks for the offer, though - we might have to take up on that."

"Anytime."

Of course. Anytime, he offered genuinely. It was so Brian, and suddenly she didn't know what to say. She turned around to reach for a cup and poured coffee for Brian along with her own. She knew, without him telling her, how he liked his coffee. This was comfortable, easy, and happy. Yet...

Yet, they still hadn't talked about what happened back in the courtroom, on that fateful day.

She had waited for him to begin, but now it was becoming obvious that she might have to initiate the conversation. But then, what was there to say to him? What could she possibly tell him? That she loved him, too? But the words, mere words meant so little, when he was already giving her so much, when he already knew her this well, when he was already to give his life for hers.

What do you say to a person who could love you like that?

She still didn't know, and he hadn't asked for any. And in her hand was a cup of coffee made the way Brian liked his.

"Brian," she blurted out without thinking.

"...Yeah?" She might be imagining a hint of hesitation in his voice, uncertainty. Maybe, maybe not. But this couldn't go on.

She still had her back on him, so, mind made, she put on her best determined smile and turned around. "Brian, when are we going to --"

"Peluso," Jessica Rossi said, poking her head into the kitchen. "Hey, Cabot's looking for you. Something about the Mariano case?"

"Ah, uh -" Brian froze, then stopped, looking at Jess. He then looked back at Christina, raking his hair with his fingers. "I, ah, I've gotta take this. We'll pick up this conversation later, okay?"

"Ah. Um, of course." Christina nodded as Brian left looking quite harried.

His cup of coffee was still in her hand, and she stared at it for a moment, feeling rather inarticulate. Of course the Mariano case should take precedent. She recalled the drive-by gang shooting case which made a lot of people extremely unhappy before - before the daughter of a senator was raped and murdered, before Wade took over the court room on that fateful day and started talking hostages. But that was the thing of the past. Only two weeks, but past was past. Things were going back to schedule. Back to normal, business as usual.

Except...except she wasn't sure where that left her. Left her and Peluso. Brian.

"Okay, what's wrong?"

Christina almost jumped. Jess stood right beside her, peering in concern. "Nothing," Christina blurted out. "Absolutely nothing's wrong."

"Uh-huh." Jess looked less than convinced by her friend's performance. She grabbed her own mug and turned to her. "So how's it going with Brian?"

"What? Nothing." Christina made a little screeching sound and hoped Jess wasn't noticing blush creeping onto her cheek. "It's not what you think."

"Really? What exactly am I thinking?"

Jess raised her eyebrow, and Christina almost groaned. "Whatever your deranged mind is thinking up, _that_ isn't what's going on."

Jess proceeded as if she hadn't heard her. "Then when's the big date?"

"There's...there's no date," Christina said, sounding miserable even to her own ears.

Jess almost coughed into her coffee. "The guy tells the world that he's in love with you yet _still_ made no move?"

"He didn't tell the world--" Chris stopped and stared at Jess in horror. "Wait, did this get out? What do you mean, tell the world? Who's been talking? Did Potter, did he say what to --"

"Breathe! Breathe, Chris. Geez, no, no one's been talking, and no, I haven't heard anything about it. I was in the courtroom, too, remember? It was hard not to notice his declaration."

Christina started to breathe a bit easily. "Well, no. Yes. I mean, no. That's just it. We haven't talked about it."

Jess frowned. "At all?"

"Not...really." That was just it. What Brian had said that day was acknowledged, just not talked about. It was still hanging between them, but not necessarily creating discomfort. No matter what, she was still happy in every moment with him, and she knew he felt the same. Yet all these two weeks proved was that they could still be great friends and go on ignoring this unspeakable _thing_ between them. Was it what Brian wanted?

"Maybe he doesn't want to talk about it," Chris ended up saying. "Maybe, maybe he thinks it's not a good idea to go out with a co-worker. I mean, wouldn't there a rule against fraternization?"

Jess stared, incredulous. "Chris, we're not in an army."

"But how do you know? Maybe there's a rule and it's really not a good idea--"

"Believe me, Chris, I checked."

Jess was looking at her meaningfully, and Christina instantly felt idiotic. Jess and Steele, of course. "Oh, right."

"But that's not the issue here, is it?" Jess put down her mug and looked at her quietly. "How do _you_ feel? Just because he admits being in love you, doesn't mean you just suddenly love him back. It doesn't work that way, does it? So, how do you feel about Brian? Do you like him?"

"Of course," Chris said immediately. "It's Brian."

Jess left a significant pause before she asked, "Do you love him?"

Christina opened her mouth to answer, but this time mere yes or no could not suffice. "This is Brian," she repeated, because there was nothing she could say that could describe how she felt.

This was Brian. Somehow that made sense. Somehow, that was enough.

Jess knew. She put a hand on Christina's shoulder and gave her a small smile. "Then there's your answer."

* * *

TBC. 


	2. Chapter 2

Part 2:

The Mariano case was going to be a problem.

She didn't need to go through the entire file to see exactly what that problem was. Alex Cabot had handled enough cases before and after she started working as the Bureau Chief, enough to feel things instinctively when a case was about to go down the unpleasant road, and the evidence for this case, so far, was distinctly pointing down _that_ direction. The question was whether her less experienced ADAs could see it as well.

She was about to find out, because Brian Peluso, just in time, knocked on the door frame of her open office. "You wanted to see me?"

Alex took off her glasses and looked up from the file. "Yes, Brian. Come in and sit down."

The sitting down part signaled that this might be a long talk, which Brian seemingly understood. He strode in and closed the door behind him.

"You're Jim's second on the Mariano case?" she asked.

"I am," Brian answered as he sat down on the chair across her desk. "Is there a problem?"

"Nope. Just give me a debrief on the case."

It was a strange request - she could have just as easily asked her Deputy District Attorney who was leading the case to summarize for her. She knew Brian saw that one through because he raised his eyebrow before sitting straight up and starting to recount the case.

"Jake Mariano, a 16-year-old member of the fringe gang called BS, killed a member of another gang in a drive-by shooting taken place last month. An off-duty cop caught him when he was attempting to get rid of the murder weapon into the sewer several blocks away from where the shooting took place. He confessed right after, in the hope of being treated as a minor at the trial."

"Any problem with the case, in your opinion?"

He looked straight in her eyes. "Yes. The kid didn't do it."

Ah-ha. Peluso saw it, too, then. Alex closed the file in front of her and handed it to him. "Good."

Apparently that really wasn't what he expected. "Good?" "Good, as in, I agree with you. Jim's going to take a backseat and you are going to take the lead on this one. Get Jessica as your second. If you need a hand with paperwork, take Potter and show him the ropes. Any scheduling issues?"

"Nothing I can foresee right now, no," Brian answered easily, but he was sharp enough to catch on pretty fast. "Is there any other problem with the case? Is Steele having workload issues?"

"Nope."

Brian leaned against the chair. "Ah."

It was her turn to ask. "Ah?"

"Ah. As in, this is going to be a test. For me."

He saw through that, too. Even better. "Maybe. But it's not the kind where you pass or fail. You're the next in line after Jim in this team, and we think it's about time you start practicing heading high profile cases and giving out press conferences."

Brian looked momentarily taken aback. "And Steele approves?"

"He was the one with the suggestion that we should start grooming you. I happen to agree with him."

Now she did, at least. Brian had the seniority. Jessica Rossi was next, and while she came on pretty strong with her cases, she occasionally got too involved with them to be objective. Billy Desmond, while ambitious and aggressive, still required years of experience. Brian had the experience and good sense to stay right on the case, and just proved himself to be sharp enough with good instinct.

And they needed somebody. Jim, who had been the leader in the ADA team, took on the deputy role after Randolph was killed, so they needed to establish another senior leader in the ADA team for the future.

She gave Brian enough hints for him to understand the importance of the assignment, but she made sure that she wasn't giving him too much pressure. He accepted with seeming ease.

"Any issues, anything at all, that you want to discuss, you can bring it up to Jim or me."

"Got it." Brian nodded and took it as his cue to leave.

"Brian, one more thing."

"Yes?"

"I want you to see a therapist before the end of this week."

Brian paused for a second and turned around to face her again. "That was an interesting segue," he said, finally, obviously trying to sound amused but was anything but. "What, does giving press conferences these days actually require psych evaluation?"

"That doesn't sound like a half bad idea actually, but no, we would like you to go through an evaluative session for post-traumatic stress syndrome."

That did it. Brian's expression went completely flat. "I'm fine."

"Sure, I believe you." She smiled. "So go do the session."

Brian visibly restrained himself and countered, "Have I shown any indication I was suffering from PTS?"

"No, but if it was that easy to tell, would we even need a session to determine if one has it?"

"I thought it _was_ that easy to tell. For the record, the ruckus this morning? I was just trying to get myself a cup of coffee, not planning to shoot anyone from the nearest clock tower."

Alex responded to the joke with a quick smile but gave away nothing than that. "You took the blunt of the heat from the hostage situation at the court house. We want to make sure that you are as fine as you think you are."

"I didn't take the blunt of the heat. If you remember, I wasn't the only one who had to face a gun that day. Potter, Finny..." Brian paused and looked away. "No matter, because we are still all intact. More importantly, it's over. Do you see any difference in us?"

She tilted her head. "If you ask me, no. You all seem remarkably fine."

"Then why bring it up again when people are finally ready to forget about it?"

"These are valid points, and you can certainly continue to argue this with me to prove that one of my ADAs is indeed a good attorney, but see," Cabot smiled, wide, "the fact that I'm the boss means that you are going to see this doc on Thursday, at 2."

She pushed a business card across the desk. He stared at it with the 'Aw shucks' look for a second before taking it.

"Boss's order, huh?" He gave her a wry grin.

"You're catching on. Why do you think I took this job if it didn't come with any perks?"

----------------------------

The victim's crime scene photos told him next to nothing. The same with the autopsy report. The police reports had other speculations but nothing conclusive. The hard fact was that the kid had confessed and was about to face a trial. But, still, something didn't fit, and Brian had thought he was the only one who suspected the kid wasn't the one who had actually pulled the trigger.

But, no. Cabot and Steele were, too, convinced that the kid hadn't committed the crime.

And Brian was to lead the case.

Well, he'd better get started, then. He loosened his tie and reached to grab his third Red Bull that day.

It was not a bad test, really. When he thought about it, the only direction he could take this was simple yet tricky. He suspected that the kid was taking a fall for someone. Even though Jake Mariano had a pretty good motive, others would have had better ones - except, of course, nothing had turned up at the investigation stage and before the arrest. His job was to find who really was responsible for murder by pushing this case toward the right direction, by pushing it the right way. Looking through the files, he found a few holes he wanted to poke.

He was up for this challenge, he was pretty sure, but what he wasn't sure was in the business card currently stuck in his notepad that he was trying hard to ignore.

In a way, he had been lucky - lucky for more than one reason, of course. He knew about violence, so he didn't freeze in front of it. And while others probably hadn't known just what they could wish out of the hostage situation, he had. He had only one goal, only one focus - he wanted her safe. He had wanted everyone to be safe, even Wade, but the bottom line, he just wanted Chris to be safe. And she was.

He could still feel her tremble, in that frail and precious moment when she had fallen into his arms on the courthouse stairways. He could still feel her tears on his shoulder.

He dropped his pen and stared at his hand. Goddammit. She was safe. She was right next door, working on her cases and drinking copious amount of coffee.

The image almost made him smile, and his hand stopped trembling.

He picked up his pen again.

----------------------

Nick Potter looked up from the file and said, "The name of the gang is BS? Seriously? Is it an abbreviation of something?"

Jess flipped through the file. Why a drive-by shooting was suddenly worth three ADAs was a mystery to her. Then she looked at Nick and thought, okay, so maybe Nick didn't count as a full ADA just yet. A half, maybe. Still, even two and a half ADAs tied up to a case meant a big case at this point, and from what she could tell, this didn't seem to require too much work. "As far as we know," she answered, "it's always just been called BS."

"What an unfortunate choice for a supposedly scary gang. I mean, it's just begging for it, isn't it?"

Jess rolled her eyes. "Are _you_ willing to give the heart to heart talk to gun-trotting teenagers to let them know exactly what kind of wrong connotations the name 'BS' has?"

"You might actually get a chance to do exactly that," Brian said, stretching in his chair. "Nick, you get to interview the witnesses, including the gang members. Jess, take the off-duty cop who caught Mariano."

She and Nick turned to Brian. Jess nodded and started writing down on her notepad while Nick scrambled to grab his. "Anything specific we're looking for?" Nick asked, looking slightly off his game, which, of course, was expected.

Brian leaned forward. "You read the file. What do you think?"

Nick tried to hide the deer in the headlight look by blinking; he wasn't very successful. "Uh, are we supposed to see who might be able to testify against him?"

Brian shook his head. "We're not at that stage yet."

"Then, are we looking for, I don't know, motive?"

"Already have it. The kid's confession states that they were in rival gangs for years, and this was yet another manifestation of their turf war."

"Really? But nothing's happened the last year or so. The report doesn't mention any other incident."

Not bad, Jess thought. There was still hope for Nick. Something did seem amiss, though. If there were not even looking for ways to obtain testimony but doing the background check now, this meant... It suddenly came to Jess. "We don't think the kid did it, do we?" she asked Brian.

"Nope."

"Does this mean--"

"Yep," said Brian.

She must've sighed pretty loudly, because Nick was staring at her. "Uh, what does that mean?"

"That means we think there's more than it meets the eye and it is possible that we have a chance to apprehend more than a scared 16-year-old kid who might be guilty only of stupidity of joining a gang in the first place, not of murder."

Nick looked even more confused than ever. "But that...that's a good thing, isn't it?"

"In theory. But the direct result of that implication? We have to do more research. And even more paperwork." She turned to Brian. "So, who's doing what?"

"You talk to the police and the detective in charge of the case and see what they left out from the reports, see if we can rule out anything else. Nick, you're checking the background and history. That's it for now, and we can regroup tomorrow about this time. Anything else?" Brian asked.

"Uh, this is not necessarily related to this case, but," Nick started, looking a bit hesitant, "what's going to happen to Wade, do you know? I haven't heard anything about it since."

Suddenly, the room fell into silence. "Another team is handling it," Brian answered finally. Nick looked puzzled for a second, and frowned. "Does that mean we're pressing charges?"

"For shooting up the court house and taking a courtroom full of hostages? What do you think? Even if we understand reasoning behind the situation, it's not something we can overlook." Brian didn't look too happy about it, either, but it was just how it was.

Nick looked so completely miserable that Jess had to take a pity on him. "He should be able to get away with a minimal sentence. We can see to it."

"Okay," Nick said. He didn't look entirely convinced.

For a second, Jess thought back to what Nick had told her, on that damned day in the courthouse, but quickly pushed away the thought. It really didn't have any room for them, and thankfully, Nick hadn't shown any sign of bringing it up again.

Brian put an end to the dampened mood by standing up and shooing them out. "Get going. I want your interview reports by tomorrow."

"I've got a deposition at four," Jess said. "I'll talk to the cop tomorrow morning."

"Do that, then. Potter, see if you can get them to talk, as many of them as possible. And careful out there today, okay? Not a good place to be around."

"Uh, you want me to go interview them now?"

"What, you've got something else?"

"I might have --"

"Shelve it. This is a murder trial, and this comes first."

"Uh, um. Okay. Sure. All right."

Jess and Nick packed their things as they got up to leave Brian's office. When Jess was about to wonder if it was possible for Nick to be having a heart attack right now based purely on his anxiety level, Brian called out, "I'll meet you at the parking lot at 4."

Nick whipped around. "What?"

"For the interviews." Brian was barely containing laughter. "Don't worry, man. I'm tagging along."

Nick did such a bad job at hiding his relief from his expression as he left, muttering, "Oh thank God."

Jess shook her head at Brian. "You're a cruel, cruel guy."

"Hey, I try."

Just when Jess was about to leave, Chris poked her head in, a clipboard across her chest and looking generally adorable as she usually did. "Hey, are you guys done?"

"Just about," Brian said, brightening up instantly. Jess almost rolled her eyes. "What's up?"

Chris began to fidget a little, which Jess recognized as her standard nervous gesture. "Ah, well, do you feel like grabbing dinner, maybe? I mean, with me. Tonight?" Chris seemed to have realized that Jess was in the room just as the words were spilling out. She hastened to add, "Both of you."

If there was anything Jessica Rossi knew with absolute certainty, it was never to be a third wheel under any given circumstances. She smiled amiably. "Nope, got somewhere to be."

When both of them looked at Brian, however, his expression wasn't as bright. He looked down and made a show of collecting his folders. "Not, uh, not tonight. There's these interviews I have to do with Potter."

"Tomorrow night, then?"

If it was actually possible, Brian was avoiding looking at Chris, as if looking at her hurt him. "It's...it's not a good time right now."

"Oh." Chris' smile faltered, but only briefly. Chris picked up her cheerfulness again quite admirably with, "That's all right, then. Anyway, I'll see you tomorrow."

All right, what just happened? Jess stared at Brian, who was sorting through his files like nothing had happened, but his shoulders were stiff, his jaw set.

Jess closed the door as soon as Chris was out of earshoot and turned to Brian. "What was that?" she demanded.

Brian gathered his files without looking up. "What was what?"

"You sure are taking your sweet time, aren't you? Either that, you're balking out. Which begs the question - why?"

"Again, I have no idea what you're talking about."

"If you're worried about being a guy who's cutting in, don't worry. The coast is crystal clear."

Brian finally looked up, looking exasperated. "Are we even in the same conversation here?"

All right, now she really wanted to kick him. "She broke up with Doctor Lucas right after the incident, you idiot. You think she'd ask you out while stringing another guy along?"

This finally registered. Brian looked, frankly, a little lost. "She...Chris broke up with Doctor Lucas? Why?"

Oh my god, Jess thought. The denseness of the male species just never ceased to astonish. "Are you seriously telling me you don't know why?"

Brian looked even more stiff, almost angry, which was pretty much unlike him. "She shouldn't have. She said it, you said it, practically everyone said he's this amazing guy."

"What, you want to date _him_ instead? That's why you haven't asked her out yet?"

Brian put down the files, frowned, then straightened up. Then he looked her straight in the eyes and asked, "Who am I?"

Jess blinked. "What?"

"Who am I, Rossi?" She was beginning to suspect maybe he completely lost it, but he set his jaw, hard. "Brian Peluso, that's me. I haven't changed. You've known me for years. Would you let your sister date me?"

She said automatically, "I'd break her legs first."

Brian did a little 'See what I mean?' gesture, complete with a self-deprecating smile, then went back to collecting his files. "With that, your Honor, the prosecution rest the case."

"But my sister isn't Christina Finn."

His hand, reaching for a folder, stopped in mid-air. He closed his eyes, then a moment later continued to pack, all without turning to face her. "You make it sound like it means something."

"It kinda does, Peluso. She's Chris." And around Chris, Brian Peluso was a different guy. Which probably was the only reason she approved of this pairing.

Although, she was the one to talk, was she? She glanced outside, at Jim's office, and almost sighed. It was never easy.

"I don't know exactly what you're afraid of," she began, as carefully as she could, "but you're a brave guy. I think you already proved that."

"Probably not brave enough," Brian said, looking away. "Look, if that...that incident hasn't happened, I would have never said anything. And now..."

And now, he was deathly afraid of hurting her. This was her second epiphany of the day, and this was even less funny. The problem was that maybe she understood where Brian was coming from. This time, Jess did sigh. "Look, if it makes you feel better, I'll leave you with this thought. If you break her heart, then I'll break _your_ legs."

That almost brought out a smile onto his face. "I'm to be comforted by that thought?"

"Oh yes," she said as she turned to leave his office. "At least I didn't say anything about the rest of your faculties."

Passing by Jim's office, she was almost tempted to do something stupid. Like maybe seeing if he was available tonight. Almost, but no, because she saw him talking to Cabot heatedly about something in the office.

Oh God, the denseness of the male species was right.

Jess turned away and headed to Chris' office. She had a feeling that her friend might need a dinner companion tonight.


End file.
